If You Want To Be A Lawyer, Go To Law School
Duh. Of course going to law school is the only way to become a lawyer. But in a time of doom and gloom and countless recommendations to avoid law school at all costs, Gary Ross, a New York City-based attorney who has his own firm, penned a refreshing rebuttal to the negativity largely surrounding law school for Above the Law.
The two most encouraging points made by Ross? Biglaw isn’t everything and you don’t have to make it to a Tier 14 school to have hopes of landing a job. First, Ross claims not everyone in Biglaw is miserable. And if you believe in statistics and odds alone, you have to agree not everyone is miserable putting in long hours for demanding clients.
The broad reason why Biglaw lawyers are miserable, according to Ross, is there are a lot of things that happen beyond their control. Biglaw attorneys (generally) don’t get to make a ton of big picture decisions. However, owning your own “SmallLaw “ firm does give you that control, says Ross.
“If you like being your own boss, serving others, and making some good money to boot, SmallLaw is the place to be. It’s a challenge to carve out your own path, but it’s exciting, exhilarating, rewarding, and just about every other adjective one can think of, except dull,” Ross insists.
Ross then goes to do the nearly unthinkable—he defends unaccredited law schools. His argument is if you know without a doubt you want to be a lawyer and what type of law you absolutely want to practice, don’t spend hundreds of thousands on a brand name law school.
The example Ross gives to backup his claim is Nashville School of Law. When Ross was a social worker in Nashville, he says the one court case he was a part of everyone from the defense attorney to the prosecutor to the judge were from Nashville School of Law, which is only accredited by the state of Tennessee. What’s more, he says, Al Gore, Sr. graduated from the school.
Happiness and fulfillment is still very much a possibility for being an attorney. It’s actually probably pretty common. It just takes knowing what you want being OK with not spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a brand name school.
Source: Above the Law
DON’T MISS: POWER OF PRESTIGIOUS LAW DEGREE PERSISTS
Video Of The Week:
Reflections from the Harvard Law Class of 2015
Questions about this article? Email us or leave a comment below.